Swing Shift

A sleek, sonically enhanced jazz venue opens
in the Time Warner Center complex.

The Time Warner Center presented New Yorkers with several things we didn’t know we needed—a vertical mall, a three-star food court, a concert hall devoted to jazz. But it is this last feature that we will be most grateful for. Driven by the artistic vision of Wynton Marsalis and the institutional power of Lincoln Center, a spectacular world-class home for jazz will open there on October 18, including a pristine 1,200-seat concert hall, an intimate bar with a stage set overlooking Central Park, and a series of other performance and rehearsal spaces. The designer was architect Rafael Viñoly, who happens to be a brilliant classical pianist but says he “never had the guts to play jazz.” Guided by Marsalis, who asked that the main Frederick P. Rose Hall be “syncopated and unpredictable, but not eccentric,” Viñoly came up with a softly toned environment that is both minimal and warm. “The idea was not to make a jazzy environment,” says Viñoly, “but a place that could be taken over by the music.” To that end, the Rose theater was constructed as a separate structure within the Center, a box within a box, cutting outside noise almost to nothing and allowing a greatly enhanced listening experience. Opening-night festivities will include a Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra date with Marsalis.